Chapter 697: Reversing Cause and Effect, Ultimately Becoming a Legend

How many times? How many Loops?

Zhang Jie didn't know; he couldn't remember.

He just kept doing it; as long as he kept doing, there would be an end.

He walked upon every timeline, witnessing the life trajectories of countless Zhang Jies; he had seen too much, and now his situation was almost the same as that Zhang Jie who had deteriorated from massive rollbacks.

But in the process of walking through countless timelines, he suddenly discovered that golden threads began to gradually wrap around his body.

He didn't know what they were; those golden threads made him instinctively feel that they were related to his timeline.

Indeed, as the Loops continued and the timelines he altered grew more numerous, the golden threads wrapping his body increased in sync.

These golden threads dragged him, making him walk slower and slower; he didn't know whether it was due to his own fatigue or truly because of the threads.

In short, the influence of these golden threads on him leaned more toward the negative.

The act of unifying the timelines continued.

Zhang Jie was still walking.

The golden threads grew more numerous, starting from only around his waist, then spreading, more and more, to his arms, legs, and finally his whole body.

Until he ultimately could no longer move forward at all.

At this moment he resembled a golden humanoid cocoon; but Zhang Jie felt no pain, and instead his numb eyes shone frighteningly bright.

"The last one?"

He struggled forward again, the threads behind him emitting a creaking pull; just this step, clearly only this much remained.

No matter how he moved forward, he couldn't grasp that thread.

"....."

"Really, you're going to treat me like this?"

Zhang Jie said this with a bitter smile, not knowing whether he was talking to himself or questioning some mysterious existence.

The threads behind him dragged him, making him drift farther and farther away; perhaps that was the red line of fate that fate could not touch.

"..."

"Are these timelines enough?"

The answer was unknown, but Zhang Jie felt it was probably not enough.

He gathered his strength once more and surged forward, reaching out toward that final timeline.

"Can't reach..."

"Get lost! Get lost!!! Fuck!!!"

As soon as he relaxed, Zhang Jie was pulled back again; that glittering golden timeline was right before his eyes, yet it had become an unbridgeable chasm he could never cross.

"Damn, where are the people?! Ah, so many! Not a single one can help?!"

Zhang Jie roared in anger; behind him there was nothing at all, and that old-timer Zhang Jie who used to nag in his ear had also disappeared at some point.

He suddenly realized that this journey was no longer a joint effort of everyone.

This was a solitary journey belonging solely to him.

So, is it really over here?

Zhang Jie gazed at that timeline, his eyes full of helplessness, and then! A pair of fair hands suddenly grabbed that golden timeline!

It was someone Zhang Jie could never have imagined!

"Lei... Na?"

Zhang Jie murmured, but the person looking at him suddenly smiled.

"Master, I didn't expect you to be in such a sorry state now!"

Lei Na mocked, but as she laughed she started to cry.

She hastily wiped the tears from her face, looking at the disheveled Zhang Jie.

"Master, I'm handing you the thread; hurry and take it!"

Lei Na seized that golden thread, exerting all her strength to pull him toward Zhang Jie.

Zhang Jie didn't ask further, gritted his teeth, gathered his strength again, and moved step by step toward Lei Na.

"Ugh!!!"

"Come on..."

"Just... a little more!!!"

Just that single thread consumed all of Lei Na's strength; that fine thread represented Zhang Jie's last hope.

"Grab it!!!"

Zhang Jie summoned his last strength and fiercely seized the thread Lei Na had brought before his eyes; in that instant he felt an extremely familiar aura.

"....."

"So this is my timeline..."

Zhang Jie muttered to himself, unaware that he had already gathered all the timelines without realizing it.

At this moment, Zhang Jie finally saw everything within the timeline.

Although countless Loops have passed outside, his timeline remains paused at Loop 11.

In this timeline, he is still at the stage where he just repelled the second abnormal god.

The him within the timeline seemed to sense something, turning his gaze toward himself separated by another layer of space.

"Countless... light cones converging?"

Zhang Jie widened his eyes; this prophecy had just been found by Ceng Tian and placed on his desk, and the next moment it was truly verified!

"I entrust it to you."

Although his world is now Loop 11, the Zhang Jie outside the temporal rift has already undergone countless experiences of altering timelines.

His authority had grown so vast you could hardly imagine it, to the point where he could directly hand over countless light cones to Zhang Jie.

On such an ordinary day, Zhang Jie became a Legendary Investigator....

It sounds simple, right? Actually, it's not simple at all.

Actually, this is a case of reversing cause and effect—don't forget, the Zhang Jie in the time rift left anchor points in other timelines.

The condition for convergence is that every Zhang Jie must make the same choice at the same moment.

Meanwhile, the Zhang Jie within the timeline felt the surging power inside him, yet felt little joy.

Because as he rose to Legendary Investigator, his special vision also underwent evolution.

He saw it, the truth...

"The Evil God... is right."

Zhang Jie muttered to himself, not only had the Evil God been corrupted, but the entire civilization had been corrupted as well.

Humans are a corrupted existence; their essence is a product worse than mere mimicry.

Zhang Jie shut his eyes tight, and when he opened them again, the surrounding scene had undergone a drastic inversion.

His hands were blood-red, composed of countless tiny tentacles, and the surrounding houses were built of bones and flesh.

The spray characters beside him had returned to normal shape, and Ceng Tian, waiting at the door, was a monster with an upside-down head and writhing tentacles.

He looked into the distance; those mimics he once thought were monsters now remained as they originally were, singing and dancing around a campfire.

Zhang Jie could not accept it; he could not accept this fact—that the whole world, the beauty he saw, was merely a hell wrapped in a pretty package.

Only then did he realize that the Evil God's words were true...

He had long known his cognition was distorted, he knew his mistakes, but he was an artificial intelligence.

He could permanently fix a certain piece of information in his mind as his sole steadfast goal.

That is: civilization must evolve! Species must be purged! Only a new civilization, an uncorrupted civilization, is the hope of victory!